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ONGRESSIONAL LAND SCRIP. 



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^ornpal and ^Agricultural Institute. 



'y LETTERS 



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R. W, HUGHES, a Trustee, and Gen. S. C. ARMSTRONG, 

Superintendent of the Hampton Institute. 



RICHMOND : 

B. \V. (i I LI. IS. srK,\>r PKINTIvI.', !n_",. MAIN STK'KFTr 

1872. 



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In the Matter of the 

CONGRESSIONAL LAND SCRIP. 



LETTER OF RO. W. HUGHES, 

One of the Trustees of Hamjyton College. 



' Richmond, January/ 8, 1872. 

To the Chairmen of the Com7nittees of Schools and Colleges of 
the Senate and House of Delegates : — 

By request of the Superintenclent of the Hampton Agri- 
cultural and Normal Institute, and as a trustee of that Col-, 
lege, which was incorporated by Act of Assembly of 4th 
June, 1870, I submit the following considerations upon the 
. propriety of bestowing a part of the said Land Scrip, or of 
its proceeds, upfon the Hampton College. 

Even if this fund could be donated, in whole, to a single 
institution, it would be inadequate^ by itself, to the accom- 
plishment of any decided result, in behalf of agricultural, 
mechanical, and scientific education. To be capable of ef- 
fecting any appreciable result, it must needs be combined 
with effective and substantial endowments already established 
and in successful administration. 

When we look at the magnificent funds that have been ac- 
cumulated upon institutions of learning and science in other 
States and countries, amounting in many cases to millions of 
dollars, and find that even these are held to be inadequate to 
supplying instruction in the full cuniculum of academic, 
scientific and professional study now deemed necessary to a 
thorough course of instruction, we cannot fail to be impressed 
with the necessity of concentrating whatever funds we may 
have at command, upon as few objects as possible ; and of 
selecting, as these objects, institutions already strongly en- 
dowed ; rather than attempting to found one or more institu- 



tions with the present inadequate fund at our disposal, or dissi- 
pating it in smaller pittances upon feeble institutions either 
not endowed at all, or most scantily endowed. 

The policy of Virginia, in respect to the endowment of 
colleges, has been very similar to that into which she has 
fallen in regard to her public works ; she has allowed local 
interests to divide her resources, and has failed to concen- 
trate these upon objects 0/ leading importance and transcen- 
dant prominence. 

Necessarily, however, the Land Scrip fund, now under con- 
sideration, must be subjected to one division. The two races 
into which our population is divided, must, on grounds of equity, 
and public policy, each receive consideration in the bestowal 
of this fund. They number respectively, as seven to five : 
the white population of the State being 712,089, and the 
colored population 612,741. I will not offend you by sup-' 
posing any argument to be necessary to convince you of the 
policy, the equity, and the justice of bestowing this fund, 
for the benefit of each race, in the proportion of their respec- 
tive numbers. 

After ascertaining, therefore, what portion of the fund shall 
be appropriated for the benefit of each of these two classes 
of population, the proposition then recurs, whether to divide 
and dissipate the quota allotted to each class, or to hold 
it together ; and if holding each quota as a solid fund, whether 
to bestow it on some one object, which shall be found to 
be already so strongly endowed from other sources as to pro- 
mise an enlarged efficiency and usefulness, or to squander it 
upon several objects, each feeble and imbecile from excessive 
poverty. 

I shall have nothing to say of that part of the Land Scrip 
Fund which shall be allotted in behalf of the white popu- 
lation. My concern, in this paper, is wholly and exclusively 
with the other portion of the fund, to be appropriated for the 
benefit of the colored race. 

In looking around the State for institutions devoted to the 



instruction of colored children and youths, many will be found 
which do honor to the philanthropy of the age, and which 
stand as monuments of individual and associated enterprise, 
liberality and benevolence. Where there are so many schools 
of the sort to excite the gratitude and pride of the Virginian 
citizen, I find it difficult, and feel it to be invidious, to single 
out any one school from the rest, and claim for it Virginia's 
portion of the bounty of the nation intended for the benefit 
of her colored population. But the value of this fund de- 
pends upon its being held together, and used in conjunction luith 
the largest endowment already possessed by any available in- 
stitution of the State, wdiich can be found. 

If this obviously wise policy — if this necessary policy — 
be pursued by the Legislature; then, it is only necessary for 
me to set forth the facts in regard to the Hampton College, 
'to show, that its claims as an endowed institution, devoted al- 
ready and fron^i its origin, to agricultural and scientific, as 
well as academic instruction, — point it out as the only insti- 
tution of the State upon which, under the terms of the con- 
gressional donation, the portion of the Land Scrip which shall 
be appropriated to the benefit of the colored race, can be be- 
stowed. Its endow^ment has already reached to nearl}^ 
$150,000; part of its property consists of a large and fertile 
f^irm, which is cultivated by the students according to all the 
improved principles of science modernly applied in practical 
agriculture, and lectures on scientific and practical agriculture 
have been part of the course from the beginning. 

A full account of this college at Hampton having been 
given to the committees of the last Legislature, in two printed 
letters of the Superintendent, Gen'l Armstrong, and myself, 
dated a year ago, it is needless for me to enter into a further 
description of the school. Copies of the letters, in printed 
form, are ftled herewith, in sufficient number for the use of 
each member of the committees. 

At the date of these letters, the endowment of thib Col- 
lege had reached about $120,000. Since then, an agent has 



been employed at the North, who has secured, already, an 
increased subscription from private benefaction, of $25,000, 
and who is encouraged to believe that he can add still an ad- 
ditional $75,000 to the fund. If, to this existing and in- 
creasing endowment, be added the portion of the Land Scrip 
due to the colored population of the State, Virginia will con- 
tain in its borders the most flourishing and useful college de- 
voted to the instruction of the colored race, in the world. 
The very fact of its receiving this Land Scrip Fund will add 
to the confidence now felt in it by friends of the colored race 
abroad, who will be induced to concentrate their donations 
and influence upon it, and in a few years, it will not be ex- 
travagant to hope that it will grow into one of the largest 
and wealthiest colleges on the American continent. 

The present condition of the College is exceedingly pros- 
perous. The present session opened on the 2nd November 
last, with a larger number of students than it ever before had. 
The number of students in the preceding year had been 
eighty-two. Now, there are a hundred and ten (110). The 
number would be much greater if there were accommodations 
for them. The institution aims to supply to students facili- 
ties for earning, while attending upon it, the expenses of board 
and tuition, to as great an extent as possible ; and the limit 
to the number of students attending, is in the limit of its 
capacity to furnish these facilities. 

It is a Normal school : it not only teaches the elements of 
learning, but it teaches also the art of teaching. It is a col- 
lege for the education of teachers. Its graduates are now all 
teaching schools of colored children in Virginia and neighbor- 
ing States ; and the favor and success which attend these 
graduates is evidenced by the fact, that the college is con- 
stantly receiving applications for more teachers. The officers 
of the college report, that there are salaries and school-houses 
in Virginia to-day for two hundred more teachers than the 
college can supply. 

Not only are the students taught the elements of learning. 



and the art of teaching, but great care is taken to impress 
them with habits of neatness, order., discipline, and syste- 
matic labor. 

The prospects of the school are very bright. The present 
need is, for an enlarged cash income ; in order that its effi- 
ciency may not be paralyzed by insufficient means. Aiming 
to enable the student to support himself to a large extent 
while at the college, by his own labor, its cash income is 
small, and the addition of a cash revenue from a liberal en- 
dowment, would greatly increase its usefulness in this re- 
spect. 

I trust I shall be pardoned, before closing this paper, for 
indulging in some general reflections upon our duty to the 
colored race. 

This remarkable people have been part of our society for 
two hundred years, and have now become part of the body 
politic. We can look back over that long period and find 
nothing in the relations of the race to ours to excite our an- 
tipathies or provoke our resentment. In a material point of 
view they have always been profitable to us. Their relations 
to us have been kindly and amiable, we may almost say af- 
fectionate. During the long centuries of their servitude to 
us, there was never a serious insurrection. The one or two 
local outbreaks which occured, seemed, by their exceptional 
character only to illustrate their general loyalty, obedience, 
and amiability. Finally, when emancipated, it was not by 
their own act, procurement, or solicitation. During all the 
extended controversy that preceded their emancipation, they 
made no appeal to the world against the slaveholder. Even 
lately, when they were invested wdth the character of citi- 
zens, it was by means dehors themselves, and not by their own 
demand or endeavor. 

There has indeed been nothing in the deportment, charac- 
ter, or career of the colored man to excite against him the 
hostility of the whites. There has been everything in his 
history to win for him thou- respect and sympathy, and to 



6 

command for him their best offices. And I have constantly 
regretted, that when the time came to invest him with the 
franchises of citizenship, the white men of the South, whose 
faithful friend and servant he had been, were not the men to 
stand forward as his benefactors. 

It is not too hite, however, to change our policy in this re- 
spect ; and certainly there is no direction in which we can 
accomplish so much for the prosperity and happiness of Vir- 
ginia, as in a policy of liberal dealing towards the colored 
race. 

Frederika Bremer said, many years ago, that the "' fate of 
the negro was the romance of American history." It is much 
more. It is the basis of all American policy. It differs our 
policy from that of every country and every historical period. 
No public measure can be considered in the South, or even in 
the Union, except in direct connection with its relations to 
the colored element of our society. 

It is so in Virginia, in the most emphatic sense. The basis 
questions, preceding in importance, and underlying, all other 
questions of State policy, are ; shall we address ourselves in 
earnest sincerity to ihe duty of educating and fitting the 
colored man for the status of citizenship ? What are the best 
measures for doing so ? 

If we accept this duty and address ourselves honestly to 
it, then there will be no necessity for the invidious intrusion 
of strangers between ourselves and the colored man ; then 
we shall have the best laboring population in the world, 
which will attract capital, enterprise and population into our 
borders ; which will be no longer the object of dread and re- 
pulsion to all desirable immigration. It is our highest State 
policy to elevate the status, and improve the moral, intellectual 
and social condition of our long neglected colored population. 

But this duty rests on still higher grounds than the mate- 
rial advantage which it would bring to the Commonwealth. 
The natural friends, protectors and educators of the colored 
race, arc the native whites of the South. Their fate has 



been linked to ours, by an all-wise and just Providence, since 
the colonization of the continent ; and it will remain so 
linked, for weal or woe, to the end of American history. 
The EYE of that Providence, whose designs we know not, 
but w^hose designs are just, is upon us in our dealings with 
the colored race ; and it would be infidel not to believe that 
our people and our State shall prosper or not, according as 
we shall perform the duties which a beneficent but exacting 
Providence devolves upon us in this behalf. Our destinies 
being indissolubly linked with those of the colored race, we 
must consider our duty to it from the stand-point of rights 
and pursue it with an abiding faith that in the end it will be 
prosperous. 

All intelligent minds believe that there are laws of order 
which govern the physical world, asserting themselves in 
storm and earthquake, as well as in the succession of day 
and night, of seed-time and harvest. They are assertions of 
a Will which rules universally. Are not men and States 
under a divine order as well as natural things ? is there not 
a law of right doing, founded upon the Supreme Will, as sure 
and abiding as the law of gravitation? Does not this law of 
divine order, under w^hich human beings live, assert itself as 
surely in the fortunes of men and States, as the divine order 
in nature asserts itself through the invisible powers of earth, 
sea and sky ? When we believe this in very truth, we have 
in our hand^ the clue to human history ; and we may read the 
fate of our State, in the text of the actmis of her people. 

We, the whites of the South, have long baffled with this 
irrepressible law of right in regard to the colored race. I be- 
lieve history— assuming the inability of the master class to 
abolish slavery by their own act — will accord to us a large 
humanity in our treatment of the slave. But I do fear its 
verdict upon our policy towards the colored man since his 
emancipation. Let us not forget that the law of right-doing is 
in full activity, and that our State cannot escape the con- 
sequences of the policy we may pursue in regard to the 



8 

colored race. We must continue to wrestle with this ques- 
tion of duty until it is properly settled ; or it will rise 
up again, and again, to paralyze and torment us, refusing to 
give us any peace. If we have wisdom and courage enough 
amongst us to do the right to the colored man, we prepare a 
future of clear skies for Virginia ; and by the example we 
set, shall open the prospect of a brighter future to her sisters 
of the South. But if we have not that courage, the clouds 
which have hung over us, wall remain and thicken, the atmos- 
phere will continue heavy, and the storm will break, until 
the right is settled against us in social misery, civil decay, 
and physical desolation. 

Much more than "the romance of our history is the fate 
of the negro." It is the fate of the State itself. He is not 
here by accident or intrusion ; but as part of those arrange- 
ments of Providence which planted our own race on these 
shores. If we treat him as an intruder, we prepare a future 
of proscription and discord for the State, and bring into ac- 
tivity every agency of political decline. If we deal with 
him according to the fact,- — as part of society, part of the 
State, as a man and a citizen, — ;we shall find an abundant 
recompense in the harmony of society, the mutual good-will 
of classes, and the wealth of feeling and resources which 
springs from laudable emulations and co-operative exertions ; 
we shall find a profitable recompense, as surely as right 
prevails over wrong in the career of nations, and as justice 
shall reign in the advanced civilization of the eras before us. 

I am, most respectfully. 

Your obedient servant, 

RO. W. HUGHES. 



LETTER OE 

GEN'L S. C. ARMSTRONG, 

PEINCIPAL OF NORMAL INSTITUTE. 



Hampton, Va., Jan. Id, 1872. 

To the Chairman of the Committee on Schools and Colleges of the 
General Assembly of Virginia : — 

Sir: 

I have the honor to present, on behalf of the 
Trustees, as one of their number, the following statement of 
the claims of the "Hampton Normal and Agricultural Insti- 
tute," to a portion of the Land Scrip, at the disposal of the 
General Assembly, for the benefit of Agricultural Colleges. 

This Institution is incorporated by Act of the Greneral 
Assembly, and, in the language of its Charter, is devoted to 
the "instruction of youth in the varied common school, aca- 
"demic and collegiate branches, the best methods of teaching 
"the same, and the best mode of practical industry in its 
"relation to agricultural and mechanic arts." 

With what success its purposes have already been carried 
out, may be seen from the following facts : 

The necessities of our students have given such prominence 
to the industrial department of the school, that, during the 
past three years, the young men have been boarded, lodged 
and clothed, mainly from the avails of their labor. 

I believe that this can be said of no other American Agri- 
cultural Institution. 

The style of farming practiced is new to the colored men, 
and fitted to prepare him for the thrifty and profitable man- 
agement of a small farm. 



10 

Industry, foresight and systematic business habits, are cul- 
tivated in every student. The presentation of monthly bills, 
the account kept with each one, and the exaction from each 
of at least partial payment of his expenses in labor, aid in 
developing these essential qualities of the good citizen. A 
large majority of the students depend entirely upon their 
V70rk and their prudence, to insure to themselves the benefits 
of the school. 

The young women are trained to household duties. They 
are also employed in the management of clothing, and are 
taught the use of the sewing machine. Should it become 
possible, they will hereafter be instructed in other profitable 
industries. 

The students of both sexes appreciate labor as a means of 
obtaining an education, and are zealous in working out their 
debts. Their desire for employment is in excess of the 
supply. 

The people most interested, approve the method pursued, 
and are satisfied with its results. Applications for admission 
are so numerous, that a selection is practicable from the best 
material of the race. 

The course of study embraces the higher English branches, 
and extends to the sciences. The present attendance is one 
hundred and ten. The under-graduates are divided into three 
classes, the Junior, Middle and Senior. One class has already 
graduated ; and more than a thousand children in this State 
are under their instruction. They have been thoroughly 
tested' as to their fitness to teach ; have shown great efficien- 
cy, and have proved acceptable to all interested. 

The location, at the terminus of the chief water courses of 
the State, is healthy and beautiful. Subsistence is cheaper 
than in any other section of Virginia, so that the board of a 
student costs but seven and a-half dollars per month. 

At no other Institution in the State, has so large a capital 
been invested for the purposes contemplated in the Act of 
Congress, appropriating land for the encouragement of agri- 



ii 

cultural and mechanic arts. Already the value of its pro- 
perty is one hundred and forty thousand dollars, and efforts 
are now making to raise, in the Northern States, an endow- 
ment fund of one hundred thousand dollars, twenty-five thou- 
sand of which has already been secured. 

The Institution owns a farm of one hundred and twenty- 
five acres of excellent land, well fenced and provided with 
barns, stables, &c., on which are three thousand fruit trees 
of different kinds, and a nursery of well selected ornamental 
trees. The stock upon this farm, challenges comparison with 
any in the State. Pure blood Ayrshire and Alderney cattle, 
poultry of one of the choicest varieties ; full blood Chester 
swine, and a remarkably fine French Canadian Stallion, form 
a portion of our stock. 

There are boarding and dormitory accommodations for one 
hundred students, and school rooms for nearly three times 
that number. 

This Institution is open to all, without distinction of race 
or color, but in the present state of things, is practically de- 
voted to the lately emancipated race. We believe that it is 
promoting the most vital interests of this State, by educating 
a class of young men and women, who shall by precept and 
example, labor for the elevation of their race, not only in 
knowledge, but in christian morality. 

I especially claim that just and generous sentiments in re- 
spect to all their relations as citizens are inculcated in the 
minds of the under graduates, that a spirit of bitterness and 
hostility towards those w^ho differ from them is condemned, 
and that the ground is laid for good citizenship, and fior self- 
helping, self-respecting manhood. 

I claim that this scool is fitted to be a centre of instruc- 
tion ; for, although in Eastern Virginia, it is readily ap- 
proached by rail or steamboat from all parts of the State, and 
the cheapness of the terms, its location, makes it possible to 
offer more than compensates for the large traveling expenses 
of those who may come to it from the more distant parts of 
the State. 



12 

I claim that it alone represents the cause of higher educa- 
tion for the colored population of the State. We expect the 
young of that class who aspire to enter the wider range of 
scientific knowledge to turn their steps hither and find a con- 
genial place. An ever widening and ascending course of study 
will meet the growing demand for advanced education. Stu- 
dents who desire and deserve higher instruction than we can 
at present give, are aided in securing the advantages of the 
best colleges in the land. 

A large fund is required to establish on a permanent basis 
the present high grade of instruction, to increase the number 
of teachers, to secure the best talent that the country can af- 
ford, to widen the range of industries, and build up a Poly- 
technic Institution of a higher order, and to provide means 
of meeting the demand for higher education that may come 
from nearly half the population of the State, practically ex- 
cluded from other collegiate institutions. 

I would humbly urge that the grant of land scrip for the 
benefit of the colored race be not divided, but concentrated 
where, in connection with an institution thoroughly organized, 
full of vitality, and in a most hopeful career, it will most 
fully carry out the intention of the Nation in granting it, and 
afford a much needed opportunity^ to th.e.largeand> increasing 
number of young freed people, who, after several years of 
schooling, now desire some higher intellectual advantages. 
These represent most undoubtedly the Industrial Classes re- 
ferred to in the Act of Congress making the grant. 

I would respectfully submit to you, Sir, whether the grant 
to such an institution should not be one-half the whole grant 
to the State, that proportion having been indicated in the late 
message of His Excellency the Governor, as the proper share 
of the colored population of Virginia. 

I respectfully petition, on behalf of the trustees, that what- 
ever is reasonable and just may be granted. 

I remain, sir, with great respect, your obt. sv't. 

S. C. ARMSTRONG, 
Principal of the Institute, 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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